All, it's been over a year now that I've been using an OR Shift Bar (the 2.0 to be precise) and I have to give it a glowing review. I have been riding OR equipment for about 5 years now, and so naturally the Shift bar is what I'd be using, but hear me out.
shift bar capture.JPG (51.17 KiB) Viewed 1294 times
Previous bars I've owned: Liquid Force bars (early 2010s), Naish bars circa 2010, and OR Pilot bars 2017-2019 - all below the bar (BTB) and above the bar (ATB) power systems.
The Shift bars have high-end lines and such, but what it really comes down to for me has been it's main attraction: the ability to adjust power from the bump (to depower) or turn (to power) of a sizeable rubber knob on the end of the bar. ATB and BTB power adjustment systems can work ok, but when you're lit it sure is nice to not have to fight the wind by pulling on a strap! It's so easy to adjust power that I do it often, whereas on previous bars I wouldn't adjust as much because it wasn't very easy.
As well, the Shift bar doesn't have any line connections or things up the centre lines - it's clean - just 4 lines going from bar to kite. Nothing to get tangled in twists.
The Shift bars come with pigtails of varying lengths to enable use of the bar with older generation kites, and the bar works with non-OR brands.
I also really like the essentially unlimited reach of the bar - you can set the stopper at any height you want, which is really helpful for folks with shorter arms, but for me riding strapless I often am punching the bar out as far as I can reach to depower the kite during tricks and so it's great to be able to fine-tune the max reach of the bar. I imagine the real bonus of this system is shorter-armed folks, though, who can set the stopper to their height instead of having to deal with a bar where the bar can go out of reach easily.
I'm told the Duotone Click bar also works well, but I haven't tried it so I can't make a comparison here.
The big downside, of course, is cost. The bars cost quite a bit more than the usual.
The only other thing is that I recently cracked my retainer pin (aka donkey fifth appendage). It was always sitting bent when the bar and my harness were connected, and it finally cracked. I don't get why the pin is made so long and I need to reach out to OR to understand this better, especially because I use an OR Session 3 harness, but they are sending me a new one free of charge thankfully.
if you have any questions or would like to check out the bar and Aluula kites (and are in Squamish), let me know!